Introduction

Three inter-related concepts—corporate social responsibility, social innovation and social entrepreneurship—continue to develop momentum with governments, industry and academia (Dees & Anderson, 2006; Phillips, Lee, & Ghobadian, 2015). Yet despite heightened industry and governmental awareness of the need for these interrelated concepts, financial constraints are decreasing support for social programs and non-profit organizations (Bielefeld, 2009; Borzaga & Galera, 2014). This growing contradiction between awareness of societal obligations and budget realities has led to questioning existing solutions such as charity, exemplified by voluntourism in hospitality and tourism, while researching and implementing models to improve social capital and sustain communities (Lupton, 2011; Proehl, 2015; Richter & Norman, 2010; Simpson, 2014).

Such sustainable community development continues to grow in importance with industry, academics, governments and non-governmental organizations (Jensen, 2010; Kiss, 2004; Salazar, 2012). Controversial at times for both practitioners and scholars, the area merits additional research and theoretical development (Frances & Cuskelly, 2008; Hall, Matos, & Lorn, 2012; Lupton, 2011; Schellhorn, 2010). Scholars and industry often suggest social entrepreneurship (SE), a process that integrates economic and social value creation, as a key tool for sustainable community development (Dees, 1998; Mair & Marti, 2006). Correspondingly, scholars call for the use of theory, such as Rogers (2003) Diffusion of Innovations (DOI), to advance SE research (Bielefeld, 2009; Choi & Majumdar, 2015; Dees & Anderson, 2006; Hoogendoorn, Pennings, & Thurik, 2010; Short, Moss, & Lumpkin, 2009).

This chapter draws on SE and DOI, a popular theory of new ideas and technologies, to support a proposed model and share a case study of sustainable community development. Focusing on implementing an innovation rather than adopting an innovation, as this case study illustrates, helps critique community development (Hall et al., 2012). Rather than giving charity, which often leads to a dependency culture (Frances & Cuskelly, 2008; Lupton, 2011; Proehl, 2015; Richter & Norman, 2010; Simpson, 2014), this case study proposes a sustainable development model that culminates with SE.